This event saw Professor Kevin Morgan and Jonathan Bone from Nesta’s healthy life mission discussing public food procurement and its potential to transform the food system. The discussion centered around Professor Morgan's new book, ‘Serving the public: The Good Food Revolution in Schools, Hospitals and Prisons’, which advocates for leveraging public procurement to establish a more equitable, healthful and sustainable food system.

Morgan and Bone explored how a key challenge lies in public procurement's historical emphasis on low costs, driven by neoliberal principles, which has often overshadowed critical values like public health and ecological integrity. Morgan advocated for incorporating values-based procurement, which considers a broader spectrum of values alongside cost, as crucial to addressing the health and environmental consequences of a low-cost approach. Examples of the implementation of balanced measures and value-based procurement include the Good Food Purchasing Program in the US and the Food for Life program in the UK, which integrate values such as local economy, environmental sustainability, valued workforce, sound nutrition and animal welfare. Public bodies, such as the municipality of Oldham in Greater Manchester, can set a positive example, but their efforts require political backing and a supportive national framework to be sustainable. In this event, Kevin Morgan mentioned Malmo as a successful case study of a city with a robust school food system.

Morgan stressed the importance of learning from international examples to enhance public procurement in the UK. Success hinges on both local competence and commitment, as well as a national framework that fosters good local practices. Public food procurement has implications for public health, sustainability, poverty reduction, and the local economy. The now defunct Cornwall food program was cited as an example of a locally sourced menu that increased patient satisfaction but ultimately failed due to lack of sustained support. In addition to this, when public food procurement efforts prioritise low costs over all else, there can be some severe consequences, as exemplified by an E. coli outbreak in Welsh schools that led to hospitalisations and a fatality.

Morgan and Bone highlighted that public organisations often need to collaborate with organisations like Sustain, Soil Association and Nesta to introduce innovative ideas. To expand beyond local innovations, national organisations and government departments must identify networks and mechanisms to disseminate good practices. Financial systems should also be designed to enable and encourage innovation. Malmo's school food system, for example, has clear objectives, such as sourcing organic food and reducing carbon emissions, supported by its financial system.

Finally, a shortage of skills in public sector procurement was noted as an obstacle to building a fairer, healthier and more sustainable food system. Discussion touched upon the need for the skills required for value-based procurement to be developed, which in turn should generate positive spillover effects and stimulate local economic growth. A successful case study of this was Scotland's Good Food Nation Act, a pioneering effort that established a national framework. Morgan and Bone also touched on the NHS and the challenge of addressing a societal problem with a clinical solution, concluding that there needs to be a shift of investment towards prevention rather than treatment.